Moving on
by fred637
Summary: And sometimes Radar sees, in the same sort of the way he hears the choppers, the twisted metal skeleton of a plane settled on the bottom of the Sea of Japan.


_Disclaimer: To my great sorrow, I do not own M*A*S*H, or any of it's characters._

_Author's note: This is my take on what Radar is feeling after Abyssinia, Henry. _

_Implied Trapper/Hawkeye._

* * *

Radar dreams about planes a lot.

He dreams about deep water and brown suits and wing-tipped shoes and engraved keychains and photos of Klinger in a pink evening gown but he doesn't ever really dream of the actual crash. That's what he thinks about when he's awake. The plane went down in a streaming cloud of flames and black smoke, and the image floats up behind his slop while he eats in the mess tent.

He doesn't eat as much anymore. Trapper said that he's finally eating normal portions like the rest of them.

While he files and runs errands for Major Burns (which, he would like to make clear, is something that he does not want to do) he thinks about whether Colonel Blake screamed on his way down. Radar doubts it. Henry was the sort of guy who would stare, silent and wide-eyed, at the water as it came rushing up to crush him.

And sometimes Radar _sees _in the same sort of the way he hears the choppers, and he sees the twisted metal skeleton of a plane settled on the bottom of the Sea of Japan. It's dark down there, completely black, but he can still see somehow, and weird looking fish swim through the broken windows and brush against Henry, who is still buckled in to his seat. He could almost be sleeping off a hangover, if he wasn't about 5,000 feet below water (he had asked Hawkeye how deep the Sea of Japan was two days after Henry died and Hawkeye had stared and stared before finally telling him).

Radar isn't positive that he is actually _seeing_ the wreck, because wouldn't Henry be sort of mushed under all that pressure? Do fish even live that deep down? Radar doesn't know (there aren't any seas in Iowa), and it _feels_ like _seeing_, but he's still not convinced. It doesn't matter anyway, really, except that it does.

He just misses Henry _all the time_, and it makes him feel like a baby, _which he's not_. He's a man because he's 19 and a he's a soldier, but then he remembers that he still sleeps with a teddy bear and that he cried himself dry into his pillow when his CO was shot down.

Anyhow.

One night Radar dreamed that he was in the OR with Henry and the rest of the doctors, and he said to Henry, "Colonel Blake—" before Henry interrupted and said, "Give me a break Radar, will ya, can't you see I'm up to my elbows in this guy?" And Radar looked, and the man Henry was operating on was Henry himself, bleeding black, salty water instead of blood from his stomach and mouth. He guesses he must've shouted out or something because when he woke up Hawk was sitting next to his bed, rubbing his back and making little shushing noises. Radar sobbed into Hawkeye's shoulder until his nose ran and his head ached and, even though they didn't talk about it, the next day Hawk and Trapper were extra nice. They didn't make a single crack about his height, and the both yelled at Major Burns when he made Radar scrub out the latrines for not saluting Major Houlihan.

Radar would love it if he could be as brave as Hawkeye and Trapper. Or maybe now he should say Hawkeye and BJ. But that sounds wrong, and even though BJ is great (he really is, he's brave too), he know BJ'll _never_ replace Trap, not for Hawk anyway, just like Major Burns and Colonel Potter couldn't ever replace Henry for Radar himself.

Hawk is hurt that Trapper didn't leave a note, but what he doesn't know is that when he was flying over the Sea on his way to Tokyo for R&R, Trap was pacing back and forth in the CO's office, his face too white, until Hawk called in to tell them he'd landed. It's a pity that he didn't tell them where he'd been staying, because, well...well they tried to reach him, okay? They really did. And after everything, Radar thinks the kiss on the cheek said it all, really. Except he has a feeling that if Trap had got to say goodbye to Hawkeye in person, he would've left behind a different kind of kiss (even if Hawkeye is mad, he has to know that, he just _has_ to).

Or maybe Hawk doesn't know. Maybe that's why he and BJ are already so close. Maybe it's just Radar who's having a hard time moving on.

* * *

_I hope you enjoyed the story! Reviews and criticism are appreciated, but please be kind. :) Thanks for reading!_


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